The Long War Journal:
The rapid advance of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham and its allies is the culmination of over two years of strategy by the renewed terrorist group. Previously “virtually defeated” by American, Iraqi, and Sunni Awakening forces, ISIS has since 2011 carried out a methodical campaign of resurgence, abetted by the dissolution of Syria, the removal of US combat power, and the sectarian policies of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki’s government.
ISIS, which is leading the charge, is now seeking to consolidate its gains in Iraq and repeat its 2006 “Baghdad Belts” strategy that prefaced the worst sectarian bloodshed of the Iraq War. The challenge of removing the entrenched insurgent groups from recently gained territories will prove impossible in the short to mid-term without a number of key factors, including a change in the national government and renewed, significant international involvement in Iraq, both of which are unlikely.
It’s a sectarian war … but it isn’t
Analysts have correctly pointed out that Maliki’s polices have fueled Sunni anger and provided an opportunity for the ISIS to assert itself as the sword of the Sunnis. The ISIS offensive has been augmented by other Sunni groups, including the Naqshbandi Army, a collection of former Baathists and ostensible Islamists intent on reestablishing Sunni dominance, led by former Saddam Hussein aide Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, as well as other jihadist groups such as Ansar al Islam and Jaish al Muhajideen. Additionally, the Sunni Muslim Scholars Association, a group of hardline religious leaders who resisted the US presence in Iraq, has attempted to credit mainstream Sunni resistance, and not ISIS, for the recent offensive. And Sheikh Ali Hatim Al-Suleiman, the emir of the Dulaimi tribal confederation, has characterized the uprising as a “tribal revolution,” while at the same time denigrating “terrorists and ISIS,” reported Asharq al-Aswat.
After the US withdrew from Iraq, Maliki failed to support and integrate Sunnis into the security forces. He also attempted to arrest prominent Sunni politicians (notably Iraqi VP Tariq al-Hashimi, finance minister Rafi al-Issawi and parliamentarian Ahmed al-Alwani), and his heavy-handed break-up of (mostly) peaceful Sunni protests against his policies, coupled with minimal concessions to the protesters, has fueled great Sunni bitterness toward his regime, which is widely viewed as an Iranian puppet state. But Sunni antipathy toward Maliki and the central government should by no means be conflated with Sunni approval of ISIS and the radical Salafi jihadist ideology it springs from.
Many leaders of the Sunni tribal Sahwa (Awakening) that took place between 2005-2008 became sworn enemies of al Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq (the predecessor of ISIS) after battling them into quiescence, and the Awakening leaders’ hatred of the terrorist group’s radical ideology and its violence toward enemies and civilians alike was animated and enduring. As late as the Sunni protests begun in 2012, many protesters were publicly distancing themselves from “al Qaeda” (ISIS) as the group attempted to insert itself into the vanguard of the popular movement. And certain tribal leaders, including the widely regarded head of the Sahwa (Awakening) movement, Sheikh Ahmed Abu Risha, are still holding out against ISIS near Anbar province’s capital of Ramadi, while asking for support from former American allies.
“We’ve been fighting al Qaeda in Anbar for the past six months and we’re ready to fight for another six months, but we need American support,” Abu Risha told Bloomberg News on June 13.
At the height of its power, Abu Risha had lobbied for strategic partnership with America and proposed exporting the successful Awakening to other countries to fight al Qaeda. But he bemoaned loss of contact with his former American allies to journalist Eli Lake in late 2012:
“There is no contact right now,” he said. “They don’t visit at all. Ever since the United States withdrew, we haven’t gotten anyone to visit.”
In addition, the first two years of ISIS’ military campaign in Iraq after US withdrawal (“Destroying the Walls 1 and 2”) were devoted to the methodical assassination of prominent Sunni leaders who had fought the group during the Iraq War. This strategy was motivated by both revenge and the need to eliminate the group’s most dangerous enemies: leaders who could continue to rally Iraq’s Sunnis against the ISIS. As a result, although ISIS now has casual support among Sunnis who seek to use its military prowess to regain power, and has achieved tolerance from some tribal leaders who view ISIS as a necessary evil or have buckled in fear of the group, the mainstream nationalist Sunni agenda in Iraq greatly diverges from the violent zealotry of the terror group and its planned Islamic Caliphate.
